Able to create a custom meal and indicate number of servings

[mrshrdng1016]

I would really like to be able to build a recipie and then indicate how many servings it makes and how much I ate and see nutritional break down by servings too.  I think it would way easier than trying to enter all ingredients then when its time to eat the leftovers I can just add the recipie serving.

Moderator Edit: Clarified subject and updated label

[UrmiA]

I agree... what is the resolution?????

[Skaytn]

I am a new Fitbit user as of yesterday.  I am astounded as to what the Fitbit is missing in useability. In  Food Logging. Ultimately, this is very disappointing and discouraging,  Nowhere to create a Recipe, name it, add each ingredient with its proportions and have your software add up, then put a portion in decimals?  I was sure I just couldn't find it, as a food tracker without Recipe and Portion features is a glaring short coming in your system.  I was sure you had at least what MFP has, and more.  This is the same complaint from a number of other users.  This is a clunkiness I never expected from Fitbit. For example, I have a Smoothie of my own making for breakfast.  That's all I have.  I was asked to put in the name of my food (Bonnie's Smoothie) in favorites. Why? Clicking on it does not put it (smoothie) in "Foods" so from then on it puts the whole recipe's ingredient values under Smoothie.  If I only drank half of it, I should be able to put .5 in Portion, but no.  I entered all the ingredients and they showed up individually and gave a total for everything, but it wont take those totals for all the Macronutrients  and file it under Bonnie's Smoothie?  I resent being sent to another foods log system like MFP after I spent so much money on a Fitbit which should do all MFP does and more. I am clearly not the only one who has noticed this shortcoming of your Food tracking system. Why would you leave out individual recipes and ability to enter portions?  Seems so obvious.  You have many complaints in this area.  I would appreciate a response to this problem.

[KatLip]

What: Considering that the app already has the ability to scan food products along with their nutritional info, it would be even more beneficial to add a tab for 'Cooked', where you can piece together the ingredients for a home cooked meal (since no 2 lasagna or mac and cheese are the same) along with how many portions one batch of it makes.

How: Seeing how the database already has nutritional information for raw ingredients and branded ones, it would simply be a matter of adding the number info for each category and then dividing by portions made to get the amount per serving selected. A better title for this category would be 'Custom', but unless the team would like to change that tab to 'Added' in order to have 'Custom' refer to this new category, I think 'Cooked' would work well.

Why: This can help users make better food choices with their own home cooking, not locking them into feeling like they can only eat food with a bar code to get the most accurate read on their daily nutrition. And as an extra plus, it'll help people who cook diverse foods from different cultures to feel included as well as encouraged to use your products. 🙂

Bonus: We could even be able to manually add units of portions if we want to be super detailed about it. I'm at the phase of my weight loss where I'd be happy to weight how much one piece of my casserole weighs as well as figure out how to divide it into portions for later consumption, but this might be overzealous.

Thank you for taking the time to read through this suggestion!

[LuciaFitbit]

Hi @KatLip, thanks for taking the time to share your feedback with us. This feature suggestion already exists so I’ve moved your post here. Don't forget to add your vote! In the meantime you can add your meals from the web dashboard: Do I have to add every ingredient in a meal?

[KatLip]

@LuciaFitbit Thanks so much! I was also posting this as an idea for the app. Having to log into the dashboard for every recipe can be a bit taxing when you're starting off, especially if you cook a lot.

[KatLip]

@LuciaFitbit One thing I noticed about the dashboard version of this feature is that it doesn't allow for me to input how many servings a meal I add makes. People like to cook in advance for the week, which includes ingredient sizes that when divided by the amount of portions made, are not acceptable amounts on the dashboard. Is there a suggestion to amend that?

[Alexbro1]

Hi

Thanks all who agree and have posted.

Unfortunately I have now given up even recording food as it’s just too much effort to do if you don’t eat the bog standard meal choices such as pre-packed food.

Hoping for an update on the app which will enable this, ideally to not have to wait for the Fitbit 4

[Skilledeyes]

I would love it if you had it where we could import recipes! It would make it a lot easier when tracking macros or trying to get the over all calorie intake in. If we have to wrote down every little thing for that serving size on a meal that would be insane. Honestly all you would need to do is have an import that is able to decipher it or "create a recipe" and then have a servings section to say how many servings are available in that recipe. 

Thanks for your time! 
~Amanda

[Cathsama]

Yes! That would save me soooooo much time.

[AndieJ]

So I have been told this is resolved. But I do not know what the Fitbit mediator was suggesting when I got the resolved emailSent from my Verizon, Samsung Galaxy smartphone

[Will4Hike]

Good call Amanda.

Too bad it appears that Fitbit is not listening to us.

Cheers, Will

[lemery66]

I have abandoned my Fitbit as a result of their inability to add this
simple function. Will not upgrade, definitely won't waste money on another
one.

[Will4Hike]

Hi lemery66,

I hear you.

Being 'tone deaf' is a common practice for technology companies.  It is a worrisome practice.

Spend your money where you want to.

For me, I think that my Versa is the best activity watch, so I will overlook their failures in the software department.

I just wish that Technology companies wouldn't fear transparency; open communications really produces the best culture.

Happy exercising!

[BigRam]

It's disappointing to see how long this idea, a rather important one at that, has been out there, yet we're no closer to seeing it implemented.

I think it's safe to assume at this point that the food logging feature is simply here as marketing fodder; something to help fill out the feature list and sell units.

[rankin0]

YES YES YES!!  I cook almost exclusively from scratch. It is very inconvenient to have to add all ingredients every time i make a meal.I currently use paprika recipe manager which was inexpensive and great in that i can create or import recipes easily.  Would like to have everything available at one spot.

[pmfawcett]

I would like the ability to log all of the ingredients of a meal that I make for my family and then log that I ate 1/4 (or whatever portion) of the meal and it log it with calories/nutrients/etc.

[ManillaGorilla]

I agree the option of creating,importing or adding from website like MFP would be mighty nice! Since that’s the only reason I still use MFP is to add food diary (it seems more expansive) and more friendly and let it sync to Fitbit. Then I wouldn’t have to use them anymore and have all my info in one place. 

Thanks!

[Meagancb]

You should have the option to save meals so you don't have to add ingredient by ingredient every time. For example, I often make the same stir fry but adding all the ingredients each time is very time consuming.

[DavideFitbit]

Hi @Meagancb, thanks for taking the time to share your feedback with us about having the option to save meals, this feature suggestion already exists so I’ve moved your post here as it is currently under "Reviewed By Moderator" status. 

[Robyn531]

I agree. New to logging my food, but probably won't stick with it if I have to add individual ingredients for all meals I make everyone because I don't consistently eat the same amount each time. Way too time consuming.

[sgwingo]

I have two suggestions regarding food tracking and specifically having to do with creating and logging meals.

1) There needs to be a way to indicate the number of portions or servings in a meal you create. I almost never make a meal that is only one serving and I need to be able to indicate the number of servings just like for any food. So that when I add a meal as a lunch or a dinner I can add a single serving instead of the entire recipe. MyFitnessPal has this feature. 

2) Right now if I add a meal to dinner for example instead of adding it with the name I gave it, the app and the website both add all of the ingredients in the meal as individual items. This is ridiculous and should not happen. Again see MyFitnessPal for an example of how this should work.

I was really excited to see the updates for adding food and was hoping to switch to using my FitBit app for everything including food tracking, but the food tracking feature is useless to me without the two above features.  

[YojanaFitbit]

Hi @sgwingo! We wanted to let you know that the ideas you recently posted already exist on the Feature Suggestions Board. You can see them here where you can add your vote to those existing suggestions:
Ability to create meals on the app

Allow users to create and modify recipes in app and log serving sizes

Please try to make sure you only post one idea per suggestion, so we can keep the board organized, easily searchable and see which idea other members are voting for. Thanks for participating in Feature Suggestions!

[HollyLA19]

I really enjoy to cook and would like to log meals that I make at home without having to input 1/4th of a carrot, 1/8 of a potato, etc each time I have a serving. 

For example, I would love if the food tracking feature let you put in a meal as a whole, say "Homemade Minestrone Soup" that has all the individual ingredients & calories associated added up (ex. 10 ingredients, 400 calories total) and then when I ate portions of that soup I could put 1/4 of Homemade Minestrone Soup to show I had a 100 calorie portion for lunch.  

This feature would save me a lot of time approximating and adding individual ingredients!

[Will4Hike]

I totally agree with you. 

[KLP16]

I love the FitBit app and use it daily to track exercise, sleep, water and calories, but I find if you want an accurate calorie record, it takes so long to log every single thing you eat - especially if you do a lot of your own cooking. 

I would love to see an option to create a 'My Meals Log' where you can add individual ingredients of a meal you cook regularly, save it under a title and then just select that next time you have that meal. 

For example, if I were to log my breakfast I would add the individual ingredients (1/3 cup oats, 1/2 cup almond milk, 1 tbsp protein powder, 1 tsp cocoa powder, 1 tbsp peanut butter) and then I would be able to save it into my personal Meal Log as 'Chocolate Oats', so that when I eat it again I don't have to add each individual ingredient every time. 

I love how the app is intuitive when you eat similar items together, however if you have eggs in a few different meal combinations it then doesn't bring up the suggested items, I also find if you have a lot of items in one meal, it will only give you a list of 5 other items to add. 

Please vote for this option - I think it will be life changing!